Title: Unexpected: Realization Author: Tizzylish Pairings: Major Mal/Inara, some Simon/Kaylee and Wash/Zoe Spoilers: Takes place after the series but before the move in a ‘verse where Inara didn’t leave… Summery: It seems Mal and Inara gave into there passions for one night and then pretended it never happened. Well it looks like fate is making sure they acknowledge it. Notes: First Firefly fanfic, is unbetaed and will probably be reposted in a better final draft later…is the first part of a series….

“Simon this is impossible.” Inara spoke her voice shaking, losing some of her companion training to always keep her cool. “I can’t be…I mean I take precautions.” The last bit she said to herself more than the doctor standing in front of where she sat on the exam table.

“Inara, I’m sure you’re quite shocked by this but you are one-hundred percent pregnant. Eight weeks along it looks like.” Simon studied her face, he wasn’t a obstetrician but ever since the episode with Petaline he had memorized everything he could regarding pregnancy, labor and delivery. It helped having a photographic memory sometimes. He hoped the time would help Inara figure out who the father was it must be hard for her, not knowing.

Eight weeks, she was eight weeks pregnant. If it was eight weeks then there was only one person whose baby it could be. It had been one night, both had been out of there wits and had finally succumbed to there true desires but afterwards for reasons unknown to her they had pretended it hadn’t occurred. But she guessed fate had a funny way of making sure they would both have to remember it for the rest of there lives.

“Inara?” Simon prodded. “As your physician I am telling you that I’m not going to tell the crew. At least not until you decide what you’re going to do. If you need some more time to think things over I can bring some information in a few hours?” He was scared her characteristic calm seemed to be gone as he watched a tirade of thoughts play across her face. She seemed very deep in thought; it must be very complicated to be a companion with child. Probably all sorts of rules she would need to follow. He wasn’t sure himself of the impact of her current condition.

“Yes, that would be best; umm I’ll be in my shuttle. You don’t need to come by later I’ll probably seek you out tomorrow. For right now I need to meditate on this umm devolvement.

“Alright, then” Simon said. The companion stood up to leave the infirmary heading towards the door she was so lost in thought she didn’t see Kaylee as the engineer came bounding into the room. Inara’s arm instantly fell to cover her abdomen when the she bumped into the girl.

“Oh ‘Nara didn’t see you there. Sorry” Kaylee said noticing the lost look in the beautiful woman’s eyes. “You OK?” Her voice trembled a little for she had never seen Inara look so…rattled.

“I’m fine Kaylee” Inara smiled at her focusing her gaze on the younger woman. Putting up a careful mask of perfect health, “I’ve just been felling a bit under the weather lately, it’s nothing Simon just gave me some Rolaiumo for my stomach. I think I’ll just go back to my shuttle and sleep for awhile I’ll be fine in no time.”

“Well Ok then, I hope you feel better. Is there anything I can do for you?” Inara loved Kaylee more than anything but she really needed to be alone and the girls constant cheerfulness and concern was more than she could take at the moment.

“No, I’m fine, I’ll see you tomorrow” Inara headed towards her shuttle faster than normal and luckily not running into any of the crew along the way.

She reached her shuttle breathing in deep the lingering scents of incenses and herbal tea. She stood for a moment before lighting a new stick and kneeling down on the floor to gather her thoughts. She was pregnant; somehow he had managed to get through every barrier she had erected, why did it surprise her that his seed had been able to get past her attempts at birth control? There were so many things she wasn’t sure of, but one thing she did know was that she was going to have this child. Something in her knew that from the moment she had suspected the truth and then when Simon gave her the test results, she knew.

She forced herself to get up and turn on her cortex, she had three waves to send out, two clients she had made appointments with, and one to the Guild informing them of her leave of absence that she would be taking. The first two went off with out a hitch, the first client was a regular whom she was sorry to disappoint by not keeping the appointment, the other was a new client whom she had very little feeling towards canceling. She told both men that it seemed she would be unable to make it and that she was not sure when she would be returning to this part of the ‘verse.

However as she prepared to inform the Guild of her condition, a sense of fear over swept her. She had never wanted ties to anything. She in fact had left Serenity the first time because she was afraid of those ties, but now with out the Guild and a child that was a tie that could never break. But moving as if by auto-pilot the Companion recorded her wave to the Guild.

“It seems circumstances have arrived that I will need to take a leave form duties as a Companion. I can not go into further detail at the moment but as of this moment I will not be practicing and I am unsure when I will begin my duties again.”

Inara let out a breath after it was sent. She then shut off the device afraid of the answer she would receive. There were often only two reasons that a Companion will take leave, one she no longer wishes to be a companion or two she was pregnant. Pregnancy in a companion was frowned upon; it was seen as an easily avoidable mistake. Companions who found themselves in this, now her, position were looked down at, seen as irresponsible in the eyes of both the Guild and clientele.

She sat on her couch and began to prepare herself some tea. Normally she went to the kitchen to make herself tea and saved the stocks in the shuttle for her clients but seeing as she wouldn’t be having any of those for awhile or the fact that running into members of Serentiy’s crew seemed likely and currently unseemly. Dipping into her own stores seemed perfectly reasonable.

But now that her waves were sent and her tea was made, she faced the larger issue, “how in tyen shiao duh did she tell Mal he was going to be a father?